Charities: Government Assistance

(asked on 1st June 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, how much of the Government's £750 million support package for charities has been allocated.


Answered by
John Whittingdale Portrait
John Whittingdale
This question was answered on 4th June 2020

The £750 million funding package announced by the Government on 8 April is to ensure charities providing frontline services to vulnerable people affected by the pandemic can continue their vital work.

£360 million of this has been distributed to individual government departments based on evidence of service need. This includes £200 million to directly support hospices, which is being administered by the Department of Health and Social Care. Departments are using a range of approaches to allocating the remaining funding in order to meet identified needs quickly, including bidding processes and awarding funding directly. As applications are still open for several of the open funds, it is not possible to determine how much of this funding has been received by charities at this stage.

£370 million has been allocated to support small and medium sized charities during the pandemic. This includes £60 million funding through the Barnett formula to support charities in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Of the £310 million to be spent in England, £200 million has been distributed to the National Lottery Community Fund to award grants through the Coronavirus Community Support Fund. Applications for this fund opened on 22 May.

In addition, the Government is matching public donations to the BBC Big Night In. The first £20 million of match funding went to the National Emergencies Trust. The 47 local Community Foundations across the UK, including Scotland, Wales & Northern Ireland will then provide grant funding to eligible organisations within their community.

Further information on available funds and how to apply for them can be found at https://www.gov.uk/guidance/financial-support-for-voluntary-community-and-social-enterprise-vcse-organisations-to-respond-to-coronavirus-covid-19.

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